Kenya

February 14, 2015, Kenya (Standard) — Former Moyale MP Philip Godana was Saturday morning shot dead in a robbery at his Syokimau home, Machakos County. Police say four gunmen raided the home at about 2am as the former MP and his family slept and shot him dead following a struggle. According to officers on the ground, the attackers were out to rob the family and fired gunshots when they met resistance. Godana is husband of Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commissioner Kule Galma. Read more…

But instead of combating the rise in violence, politicians in Nairobi are talking loud and saying nothing.

December 20, 2014 (Foreign Policy) — Uhuru Kenyatta is very good at rhetoric. He’s not so good at keeping Kenya safe. Now, the president is telling Kenyans that this shortcoming is no shortcoming at all, because Kenya has problems no one can solve. In the meantime, the Kenyan economy is paying the price of his inaction.

Late last month, an attack by the militant group al-Shabab in the northeastern city of Mandera claimed the lives of 28 citizens. At the time the attack occurred, the president was in Abu Dhabi, attending the final race of the Formula 1 season. His comment was hardly inspiring: “No matter how many police officers we deploy, they will not be everywhere to watch over us.” Read more…

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20/12/2014 at 6:59 am

December 9, 2014 (Aljazeera) — Speaking exclusively to Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit, officers from four units of Kenya’s counter-terrorism apparatus admitted the police assassinate suspects on government orders. An Anti-Terrorism Police Unit (ATPU) officer said the order comes from Kenya’s National Security Council: “It comprises of the President, Deputy President, Chief of the Defence Forces, Inspector General of Police, NSIS Director, Cabinet Secretary of Interior, and the Principal Secretary Interior. Any decision is made within that club of people”. President Uhuru Kenyatta and National Security Council members denied running an extrajudicial killing programme.

Western complicity

Britain provides training, equipment and intelligence to the units, according to the officers. A General Service Unit (GSU) Recce Company officer explained: “Once they give you the training, that is all. They go back to their country and they leave us to do our work”. Israel conducts more specific training, according to a GSU Radiation Unit officer: “We get some instructors from Israel”, he said, “how to eliminate. Actually it’s one of the training”. The head of the International Bar Association warned the alleged complicity of these countries could violate international law. Mark Ellis said: “It’s clear based on these interviews that there’s at least prima facie evidence to suggest that these third party countries are involved and therefore they all have responsibility to investigate”. Britain and Israel denied involvement and the UK Foreign Office said it had “raised concerns” with Kenya over the “serious allegations”. Read more…

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09/12/2014 at 5:56 am

Kenya has endured attacks since sending troops to fight in Somalia in 2011

A protester’s hands are covered in red paint symbolizing the blood of the 28 non-Muslims singled out and killed in the recent attack on a bus by al-Shabaab. The Somali militant group struck again on Tuesday, killing 36 quarry workers. (Ben Curtis/Associated Press)

The killings happened in Mandera County near the border with Somalia and the attackers escaped, said Kenyan police chief David Kimaiyo.

The group al-Shabaab, which has been battling for years to establish hard-line Islamic rule in Somalia, claimed responsibility for the killings.

Peter Nderitu, who works at the quarry, said a group of about 50 heavily armed people walked into their camp next to the quarry at 12:30 a.m. as the men were sleeping and fired warning shots.

Nderitu said when he heard the shooting he ran and hid in a trench from where he could hear his colleagues being asked to recite the Shahada, an Islamic creed declaring oneness with God. Then gunshots followed. He said he rose from hiding two hours later when he was sure there was no more movement. He said the bodies of his colleagues were in two rows and that nearly all had been shot in the back of the head. Read more…

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02/12/2014 at 5:59 am

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, center, arrives at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, on Oct. 8. (Bart Maat/EPA)

October 9, 2014 (Washington Post) — Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, center, arrives at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands, on Oct. 8. (Bart Maat/EPA)
On Wednesday, Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta arrived at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands – the same court that charged him with crimes against humanity in 2012. While he has said that he is attending the court as a private citizen and not representing Kenya, it’s still a remarkable moment. Kenyatta is the first head of state to ever appear at the ICC since it was established in 2002 to prosecute war crimes.

“One of the principle goals in setting up the ICC was to ensure that no one, no matter how powerful, could escape justice,” Kate Cronin-Furman, a lawyer and PhD candidate at Columbia University who has worked at the Hague, says in an e-mail. “In practice, that’s not really how it’s worked out so far. Most of the cases have involved rebel commanders rather than members of government.” Read more…

July 10, 2014, ISIOLO, KENYA (Standard Digital): The widow of the late Moyale MP, Dr Guracha Galgalo has been appointed to lead the Ewaso Ng’iro North Development Authority ( Ennda).

Rehema Dida Jaldesa was picked by President Uhuru Kenyatta to be the chair person for Ennda over a period of 3 years in a gazette notice of last Friday.

She replaces long-serving Dr Abdullahi Haji Wako, a two-term MP for Isiolo South who served between 2004 until last Friday.

Rehema becomes the first woman to head the northern Kenyan based State authority which is the vastest starting from the Aberdare ranges in Nyandarua, down to arid Kieni in Nyeri, and Maua in Meru to the arid north of Laikipia, Samburu, Isiolo, Marsabit, Mandera, Wajir and Garissa.

Ennda headquarters is based in Isiolo town. Tuesday, women in Isiolo thanked President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto for appointing one of their own to the position. Read more…

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10/07/2014 at 8:28 am

Villagers in Hindi gathered by the body of a man who was killed in attacks on the Kenyan coast on Saturday night. Many victims’ hands had been tied and their throats slit, residents said.

July 7, 2014, NAIROBI, Kenya (The New York Times) — More than 20 people were killed in two attacks on Kenya’s coast on Saturday night — with residents saying that many of the victims had their hands bound and their throats slit — in the latest in a string of gruesome assaults with ethnic undercurrents.

The violence has deeply unnerved this country at a time of increasing insecurity and rising political tensions. Nonetheless, Kenya’s leading opposition politician, Raila Odinga, vowed on Sunday to press ahead with a large demonstration in downtown Nairobi, the capital, on Monday.

The Kenyan government fears that opposition supporters may try to occupy a public park, setting up what could be a bloody showdown with the police. Government officials said that such a sit-in would be illegal and that they would not allow the center of Nairobi to be turned into a Kenyan version of Tahrir Square, the plaza in Egypt’s capital, Cairo, that became the foremost symbol of the Arab Spring uprisings. Read more…

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07/07/2014 at 11:47 am

A medic attends to an injured man, a victim from an attack on a church by gunmen, at the Coast General Hospital in Kenya’s coastal town of Mombasa, March 23, 2014

March 23, 2014 (Reuters) – Gunmen shouting in a foreign language killed six worshippers in a church near the coastal city of Mombasa on Sunday, an attack of the kind that Islamist militants have been carrying out in retaliation for Kenya’s intervention in neighboring Somalia.

Witnesses said the attackers burst in through the church’s back door before shouting out and opening fire on the congregation.

“Both carried big guns and began shooting all over the place. I fell to the ground and could hear screams,” said Lilian Omondi, who was leading a prayer meeting at the time.

The attackers tried to raid a second church nearby but fled when armed police on patrol in the area appeared. A top Interior Ministry official later said they had escaped, and there was no immediate claim of responsibility. Read more…

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23/03/2014 at 3:59 pm

February 3, 2014, NAIROBI, KENYA (Standard): Two Kenyan police officers were Monday arrested in connection with the abduction of two top officials of Ethiopia’s Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) from outside a popular restaurant in Upper Hill, Nairobi last week.

The officers, an inspector and a constable attached to Nairobi Area CID are expected to face charges of espionage for Ethiopia’s intelligence services.

Nairobi head of CID Nicholas Kamwende confirmed the arrests and said the officers expected in court Monday morning. Read more…

The adoption of the veil among this group in Kenya’s refugee communities is a new thing, says Peri M. Klemm in this excerpt from “Veiling in Africa.” While there are many reasons for this push, Islam isn’t a motivation for covering up.

October 13, 2013 (WOMENSENEWS)– The adoption of the veil among Oromo refugees living in Eastleigh, Kenya, one the largest urban refugee communities in Africa, is a recent phenomenon.

Women feel increasing pressure to cover their heads and bodies in accordance with the practices of their Somali neighbors and fellow refugees. More and more, as instability and violence escalate, Oromo women are choosing to adopt full hair, head and body covering as a kind of urban camouflage with which to conceal their ethnicity. As one female resident acknowledged, “We grew up free but here we have to cover our faces.” Read more…

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13/10/2013 at 7:29 am

National politics has shifted in response to an attack by Somali terrorists, but not in the way they intended

September 27, 2013

STILL raw from the worst act of terrorism on its soil in 15 years, Kenya has rarely appeared more united than when President Uhuru Kenyatta, in an emotional address on September 24th, announced the end of a bloody attack on a showpiece mall in the capital, Nairobi. His soaring rhetoric was given added force by the fact that members of his own family were among the dead. His nephew was killed, the president said, together with his fiancée, when militants from the Shabab, a Somali Islamist group, stormed the Westgate centre three days earlier. His son and sister were inside, too, but managed to get out. Read more…

September 23, 2013 (AFP) — The Kenyan government and UNESCO on Wednesday announced the discovery of a huge supply of underground water in the impoverished, drought-stricken extreme north of the country. The find, made using advanced satellite exploration technology and backed up by UNESCO drilling, was hailed as a scientific breakthrough that could radically change the lives of the half-million people living in one of the world’s most arid regions. Two aquifers — underground layers of permeable rock or silt soaked in water — were found in the Turkana region, the scene of a devastating drought two years ago that aid workers said pushed malnutrition rates up to 37 percent. “The news about these water reserves comes at a time when reliable water supplies are highly needed,” said Judi Wakhungu, cabinet secretary in the Kenyan ministry of environment, water and natural resources. Read more…